1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a data processing apparatus including a delete function for deleting data indicated by a cursor, and also a back delete function for deleting another data positioned just before the cursor-indicated data on a display.
2 Description of the Related Art
In data processing apparatuses, e.g., a wordprocessor and a personal computer, various kinds of key operations are employed so as to efficiently enter data therein even if the key operations achieve similar functions.
For deleting the entered data, there are, for instance, both a delete function to delete the data which is being indicated by the cursor, and also a back delete function to delete another data which is positioned just before the cursor-indicated data.
In accordance with the conventional delete function, there is an advantage that an operator can surely recognize the data to be deleted since this data is positioned in a specific position indicated by a cursor.
However, this delete function has a drawback due to the fact that the data deleting operation is frequently required just after the data entry while inputting the data. In this case, since the delete key must be operated by returning the cursor to the data position preceding the present data position according to the above-described delete function, the data entry operation is slowed down.
To the contrary, the above-described known delete function can complement the above-explained drawback of the delete function. That is, in case the data just entered during the data input operation is to be deleted, this data can be readily deleted by operating the back delete key only one time, which does not cause the efficiency of the data input operation to be lowered.
This known back delete function has, however, a different drawback. Namely, since the data positioned just before the data indicated by the cursor is deleted according to the back delete function, an operator can hardly recognize the data to be deleted. In other words, the data to be deleted by this back delete function is not indicated by the cursor.
To solve these drawbacks of the conventional data processing apparatuses, another type of data processing apparatus equipped with both delete and back delete functions has been proposed. In such a data processing apparatus, two keys for executing such a similar function, i.e., the delete key and back delete key, are required. This has the disadvantage that an operator may mistakenly mainpulate the incorrect function key.